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William McKinley — and Twenty 
Years After 

By Nicholas Murray Butler 

Address at Annual Celebration of William McKinley's 

Birthday, by the Tippecanoe Club of Cleveland, Ohio, 

January 29, 1920 

Every circumstance of this gathering conspires to touch 
the heart of a Ufe-long Republican and to inspire new faith 
in the ideals and principles of the Republican Party as a 
servant of the highest purposes of the American people. 
The greatest of Republican leaders have stood in the 
presence of this club. Its very name carries back to the 
years w^hen the voices of Clay and Webster w^ere still to 
be heard in the land, and when with the elder Harrison 
the forces of nationalism and freedom that were later 
to bring the Republican Party into being were already- 
making themselves felt 

This day is the 77th anniversary of the birth of William 
McKinley, a native son of Ohio and its chiefest ornament; 
a man who, as soldier, as citizen, as legislator, and as 
president has left upon American history a mark that will 
never be effaced. The tragic circumstances of his death 
at the very moment when his power and influence 
were at their height, when new and large plans were 
maturing in his mind, have written his name high on the 
sadly long roll of those who have fallen as martyrs in public 
service. Lincoln was killed by an assassin blinded by 
passion and sectional hate. Garfield was killed by a 
typical representative of the shiftless and irresponsible 
elements that move about in every large community. 

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McKinle) was killed by one who professed himself con- 
vinced, as far as his weak mentality was capable of con- 
viction, that all government was an evil thing, and that to 
murder the highest officer of the Government of the 
United States would, in some mysterious way, advance the 
day when complete happiness and unbounded prosperity 
would be the lot of each and all. As John Ha\so truly said 
in his eloquent and moving memorial address before the 
two Houses of Congress: "Against that devilish spirit 
nothing avails — neither virtue nor patriotism, nor age 
nor youth, nor conscience nor pity". 

The murder of McKinley foreshadowed the great con- 
test that now engages a world's attention — the contest 
between law and order and the established institutions 
which freedom has built on the one hand, and on the other 
the spirit of anarchy, destruction and ruin, that would 
find in chaos some new opportunity- which order and 
liberty unite to den}-. 

It seems only yesterday that the shots of that httle 
pistol, carefully concealed in the assassin's hand, were 
heard 'round the world, carrying horror and consternation 
to civilized peoples everj^where. For the third time in 
less than forty yenvs a President of the United States was 
murdered. That very fact gives us pause. "Assassina- 
tion," said King Humbert of Italy, "is the professional 
risk of kings." We had not supposed that it was also to 
become a professional risk of presidents. If one may be 
permitted to try to draw- a helpful lesson from the shock- 
ing occurence at Buffalo, it is that that occurrence threw 
into high relief, and forced upon the attention of even 
the most unthinking, the fact that violence is every- 
where the enem\- of peaceful progress under law and that 
it can contribute nothing to human advance. 

In this presence there is no need to trace over again the 
familiar stor\- of \N^illi:mi McKink\'s life. Every detail 

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of it is well-known. It is the story of a youth of sound 
Scotch ancestr}', of modest beginnings, of frank and 
earnest purpose, of courage in battle and of high standards 
in civil life, as well as of amazing competence to lead and 
to mould his fellow men. Whether as eager debater on 
the floor of the House of Representatives, or as eloquent 
orator directly addressing the people, or as President in 
close counsel over grave matters of state, William Mc- 
Kinle}^ never failed to exhibit high and fine character, 
exceptional intelligence, and complete faith in the Ameri- 
can people. He often succeeded where others failed, 
because of his capacity for getting on with men. He 
often carried a contest through defeat to final victory, 
because of his constant hold upon controlling principles. 

It is unusual for American statesmen to show any real 
mastery of the facts of commercial and industrial life, 
or any capacity to make use of these facts in the formula- 
tion of pubHc policy. The strength of American states- 
manship has lain rather on the legal or juristic side of our 
public life, and in the development of underlying political 
principles in argument, in statute, and in executive act. 
Daniel Webster is a conspicuous illustration of notable 
achievement in this field of public endeavor. William 
McKinley^was strong where Webster was less so, and he 
in turn rarely if ever entered upon the field which Webster 
made so largely his own. Alexander Hamilton is the 
one many-sided genius in our history who was equally at 
home in the juristic and in the economic aspects of political 
life and problems, and his place at the head of the list of 
constructive American statesmen is secure. 

McKinley's keen study of the facts of industry and his 
special powers of clear exposition, have forever identified 
him with the cause of a protective tarifl^. Alexander Hamil- 
ton, Henry Clay and William McKinley form the succes- 
sion at whose hands this fundamental doctrine of the Re- 

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publican Party has been moulded and developed. Hamil- 
ton, Clay and McKinle}- alike would have resented the 
notion that there was anything fixed or sacred about any 
particular schedule or rates of duty, and the}- would have 
equally repelled the charge that they had in mind to care 
for the interests and privileges of any portion of the com- 
munity, much less of a favoured class. Fhese three states- 
men, each in his own time, in his own wa}^ and under the 
circumstances that surrounded him, urged the doctrine 
of economic independence as a necessary corollary to 
political independence. Each of them urged the imposi- 
tion of tariff duties in order that industries might be 
developed and diversified and that an American standard 
of living might be established and maintained, not at all 
in the interest of those who might happen to be immediate 
beneficiaries, but because those policies were essential to 
the prosperity, the happiness, and the independence of the 
whole people. 

The constitutional and the theoretical issues, once so 
much emphasized in these debates, are no longer discussed 
among us. Facts have made such discussion unnecessary. 
The only questions remaining are those as to the practical 
application of the principles for which Hamilton, Clay 
and McKinley stood, to changed conditions of domestic 
and international trade. All three would have been the 
first not only to acclaim but to propose such adap- 
tations. Their service lay in the fact that all three 
saw beneath and behind the purely theoretical and 
academic discussions of these practical questions, and took 
account of the stern facts of human life and human in- 
dustry, which should alone control far-reaching public 
policy. 

The unparalleled success of President McKinley in his 
dealings with the Congress of the United States is proof, 
if proof were needed, that our American government can 

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be made to work effectively if one knows how to work it. 
The frequent differences, rising sometimes to the dignity 
of quarrels, between the Executive and the Legislative 
Departments of the Government, are not, as the history 
of the McKinley administration shows, a necessary 
consequence of our constitutional system. They are 
rather the effect of inadequacies and peculiarities of the 
temperament of individuals. An executive who under- 
stands the constitutional rights and privileges of the 
Congress, and who respects the judgment and the con- 
victions of its members, will be able to cooperate with 
the Congress as McKinley did, even in most difficult 
and controverted matters, without personal friction or 
public damage. 

Strong men choose strong men as counsellors. Weak 
men are afraid to have strength in their neighborhood. A 
president who called John Hay to be Secretary of State, 
and Elihu Root to be Secretary of War, was conscious of 
his power to work with the best abiUty that the nation 
had. It would be difficult to recall an administration in 
which men of large ability worked more effectively and 
more harmoniously together in the formulation and 
and execution of public policy. 

McKinley's ways have often been described as win- 
ning, and winning they truly were. I recall an instance 
when I was asked by a group of business men to 
carry to President McKinley their vigorous criticism 
of his proposed policy in regard to Porto Rico. The}' 
objected in particular to some of the aspects of his 
fiscal policy regarding that Island. President McKinley 
listened to my exposition of those objections and critic- 
isms with the utmost patience and with perfect 
courtesy and good feeling. When I had finished he 
said, in his quiet impressive way, "Now let me tell 
you how this Porto Rico matter seems to me." Then 

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in less than five minutes, in the simplest language, with 
complete mastery of facts and with cogent argument, 
he sent me back to New York with all objections and 
criticisms completely answered . The group whose spokes- 
man I had been were at once won to his point of view and 
continued to give him ungrudging support. A man ot 
smaller mould or quicker temper would have speedily 
grown impatient under these criticisms, and might not 
have taken the trouble to bring those who wished to be 
his friends and supporters into a full understanding of his 
policies. Wherever 3^ou touch the personal history or the 
personal record of William McKinley you find this 
gentle, kindly disposition always in evidence. They were 
wrong who mistook it for weakness. It was the gentle- 
ness of a strong and kindly man, conscious of his high 
purposes and clear as to his ruling principles. It was this 
trait, as much as anything else, which gave William 
McKinley his power over the House of Representatives, 
his influence over successive National Conventions of his 
party, and finally his hold upon the confidence and af- 
fection of the people of the United States regardless of 
section, of party or of creed. 

When President McKinley was preparing his famous 
speech to be delivered at Buflr'alo on September 5, 1901, the 
very day before he was shot, he was perhaps unconsciously 
building a bridge between the policies which had been 
uppermost in his mind for twenty years, and those to 
which new conditions and new opportunities beckoned 
him. That speech contains conclusive evidence that 
President McKinley was looking fonvard and was prepar- 
ing the public mind to follow him in new policies of 
national development and usefulness. The results of the 
Spanish War, with their new responsibilities, had greatly 
changed both the point of view and the temper of the 
American people. President McKinley felt this and was 

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pointing the way to new developments of policy. He 
particularly liked the sentence "Expositions are the time- 
keepers of progress," and he made it the text of his speech 
at Buffalo. When he went on to say: "Isolation is no 
longer possible or desirable;" "Our capacity to produce 
has developed so enormously, and our products have so 
multiplied, that the problem of new markets requires our 
urgent and immediate attention;" "What we produce 
beyond our domestic consumption must have a vent 
abroad"; "The period of exclusiveness is past"; "Commer- 
cial wars are unprofitable," he was pointing the way to 
just such policies as those upon which the conditions of 
this moment invite us to enter. The world of 1920 is an 
echo of these prophecies of 1901 . 

The twenty years that have passed have carried us a 
long way from the world on which President McKinley 
looked out when he made his last speech. Since that time 
the growth of industry has been everywhere phenomenal. 
Agricultural production has advanced by leaps and 
bounds. New inventions have made the several nations 
many times more dependent upon each other than was the 
case at the time of our war with Spain. In the midst of 
all this came the Great War, which has already effected 
a dozen revolutions, some violent and some peaceful, 
with more yet to come. In what better spirit and with 
what sounder principles than those of President McKin- 
ley's last speech can we enter upon the new and severe 
tasks that just now open before us.^ 

During the sixteen important years from 1897 to 191 3, 
the Republican Party did great service to the nation. 
The Administrations of McKinley, of Roosevelt and of 
Taft mark a period of constantly expanding progress, 
of new and difficult problems wisely solved, and of large 
issues met in a spirit of finest patriotism and public 
service. What is to be said of our situation at this 

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moment when eight years of Democrat Administration 
are drawing to a fortunate close? Was our Government 
ever in so great confusion? Was there ever so much in- 
competence, extravagance and waste in the oversight of 
the pubHc business and in the disbursement of the pubhc 
funds : Was there ever so unscientific and so burdensome 
a weight of taxation? Was there ever so httle thought 
for the morrow and so complete concentration upon the 
temporary poUtical advantages of today? Was there 
ever so marked an exhibition of personal and autocratic 
rule as is shown by the stubborn unwillingness of the 
President to take into his confidence the Senate, a co- 
ordinate part of the treaty-making power, with the result 
that the whole world waits on the edge of chaos until the 
President consents to yield his purely personal views, so 
that a treaty of peace may be ratified under such conditions 
as shall both protect the independence and the sovereignty 
of the United States and better equip it for larger service 
to humanity and to the peace of the world ' Was there 
ever a time when our foreign relations were in so great' 
disorder, and when suspicion and unfriendliness were 
directed against us from every side? Was there ever a 
time when our Government looked witli sucli calm con- 
descension upon distress and rapine at our ver>- door, 
or when it declined to raise a hand to check a great 
political and social pestilence which, having ravaged the 
helpless millions of wretched Russia, is now seeking ways 
and means of communication that it ma\' infect with its 
poison healthy populations in other parts of the world? 
The spectacle is appalling, and it is wholly due to the 
incompetence which has marked the present Adminis- 
tration in its formulation and direction of public policy. 
What are we to expect when the ordinal) processes of 
Government and of diplomatic intercourse are held in 
check, while personal and official agents of the Executive 



travel about with secret messages to engage the attention 
of governments and of ruHng groups in other lands? 

If pitiless publicity could be had for but one-tenth of the 
happenings of the past eight years, the people of the 
United States would be aghast at the spectacle. When 
war was imminent and while war raged, no party voice 
could properly be raised in criticism of even the most 
outrageous acts. National unity in the face of national 
responsibihty and national peril was then imperative; 
but war is over and the time has now come for the plainest' 
of plain speaking in regard to the policies and acts of the 
Administration that we are so bent upon displacing as 
quickl}- as the provisions of the Constitution will permit. 

But it will not be sufficient to content ourselves with 
criticism, however severe and how^ever well merited, of the 
present Administration. The people expect of the next 
administration genuine progress in dealing with the 
problems that confront us. The Republican Part}' must, 
and I believe will, show itself capable of doing just this. 

First, as to the international situation. By frank and 
fair dealing and by maintaining our traditional police' of 
urging the substitution of law for force in the settlement 
of international differences, we must repair the damage 
that has been done by the grave blunders and the purel}' 
rhetorical diplomacy of the present Administration. We 
must regain the confidence of other nations in our com- 
mon sense and in our regard for the real facts of national 
and international life. We must come down from the 
clouds and walk on the earth. Whatever form the 
society of nations may take, America's part in it must be 
that of an independent, self-controlled and cooperating 
equal. We have no desire to dominate and we have no 
intention of being dominated. Least of all do we pro- 
pose to allow our national policies to be put in commission, 
or to take any part in a reckless adventure into inter- 

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national socialism. The American people are ready to act 
with broad-mindedness, with sympathy and with generosity 
in helping their sister nations and in maintaining the 
peace of the world; for as McKinle}' himself said nearly 
twenty years ago: "Isolation is no longer possible or 
desirable." 

Second, as to the domestic situation. Here the con- 
trolling questions are economic and industrial. Their 
solution involves a large increase in productive industry 
under just and humane conditions, greater economy and 
thrift, a steady contraction of our over-expanded credit 
system, a drastic reform in our methods of taxation, the 
development of a policy of cooperation rather than of 
antagonism between government and business, and a 
quick reduction in the amount of public expenditures. 
All those are in a large sense matters of business, and they 
effect not only every so-called business man, but every 
man, woman and child in the nation. The extravagance 
at Washington is something quite astounding and it cannot 
be cured until we have a well-ordered budget system, 
under the terms of which the Administration will have to 
become openly responsible to the Congress and to the 
people for recommendations as to how the year's revenue 
shall be raised and how it shall be expended. The 
Congress, in turn, will them become the constructive critic 
of the Administration, and the people will then be able to 
determine just where the responsibility lies for those things 
that are done and for those things that are undone, for 
those undertakings that are begun and for those under- 
takings that are refused. 

Our whole administrative machinery at Washington 
needs to be overhauled and reorganized on modern lines. 
We have mended and patched our administrative ma- 
chinery for more than a century, but conditions have 
now become such as to compel the scrapping of much that 

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has been and introducing new and modern machiner}- in 
its place. Only a few days ago the senior Senator from 
Colorado related in the Senate the number of steps that 
had to be taken and the amount of red tape that had to be 
unwound by constituents of his who desired permission, 
under the statute, to divert a certain amount of water 
from a small tributary of a river in Colorado that is 
classed as navigable but that is never navigated . Imagine 
the constituent's despair when, having found it necessary 
to run the gauntlet of a half dozen Government bureaus in 
three different departments, he finally found himself 
engaged in negotiations with the Government of Mexico; 
and this is but one instance among thousands. 

The domestic questions are business questions, to be 
handled in accordance with business principles and under 
the protection of the principles of the American Govern- 
ment and its ideals. 

Many are justly disturbed at the concerted attacks upon 
the principles of our Government, and even upon our form 
of government itself. These attacks, so often made in the 
name of democrac}^ are without exception not only 
undemocratic but anti-democratic. The Bolshevist rule 
in Russia is even more autocratic than the Tsar ever dared 
to be. It denies ever}^ principle of democracy, and it 
would, if it could, invade other nations and destroy 
democracy wherever it is to be found. Let us give 
solemn and severe warning that while we shall maintain 
and earnestly defend the constitutional rights of free 
speech, free press, and free assemblage, we shall not 
permit these rights to be turned into an instrument for 
doing wrong either to other citizens or to the Govern- 
ment itself. Common sense draws the line between 
liberty and license. Clear thinking indicates the point 
at which harmless and futile talk becomes a direct incite- 
ment to disorder and mob violence. Let us maintain the 

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fundamental principles of American civil libert\', but for 
ever}' one v^ho abuses those principles let the law take its 
swift and sure course. 

One of General Garfield's most important public 
speeches was made here in Cleveland on the night before 
the Ohio election in 1879. After reviewing the history- 
of the Democrat Party, with its amazing inconsequences 
and contradictions, he stated that that party had in its 
later histor}^ given to this country no great national idea 
or doctrine that had lived to be four years old. He 
asserted that whenever that party started in a campaign 
it looked at all the political barns to see how the tin roosters 
were pointing, to learn from the political weather-cocks 
which wa}^ the wind was likely to blow, and then 
made its doctrines accordingl} . In what respect has 
the Democrat Part}' changed in the last fort}' }'ears.^ 
When conditions were favourable it has seized upon a 
Republican policy, notably the reform of the banking and 
currency system, and enacted it into law. But which 
one of its policies is consistent and certain for, let us say, 
eight }^ears.^ Has the Democrat Party any policy 
toward Mexico other than one of wanton waiting.^ Has 
that party any polic}^ in international affairs save blindly 
to support the latest recommendations of the President, 
regardless of their soundness and regardless of their effect 
upon the future of the United States and of the world? 
What policy has the Democrat Party in regard to public 
finance r Its latest exploit is the amiable suggestion of the 
Secretary of the Treasury that the excess profits tax be 
abolished and the deficit made good by an increase of the 
income tax. The objections to the excess profits tax are 
overwhelming, but one wonders whether the Secretary 
in making his suggestions had taken pains to calculate 
the result. The highest authority in this country tells 
us that if the whole of the deficit caused h\' the abandon- 

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ment of the excess profits tax were to be met by income 
tax, the normal rates of the lowest incomes would have to 
be 30%, and people with incomes of $15,000 would have 
to give up about one-half of their income each year. 
What is to be said of the business capacity of an Adminis- 
tration that solemnly brings forward proposals like these? 
General Garfield in the speech to which I refer called 
upon the young men of Ohio to come out of the camp of the 
Democrat Party. He described it as looking far more 
like a graveyard for the dead than a camp for the living. 
Such a spot is no place in which to put the Hfe of a young 
American who is just beginning to discharge his public 
responsibilities as citizen. Come out of that camp. 
Come over into a camp whose army of occupation is 
dedicated to liberty, to order, to law, to justice and to 
progress. Come over to a camp where no parley is held 
with the enemies of America, and from which no half- 
Bolshevists are sent on messages of public business. Come 
over to a camp where confident hope for the future is built 
upon the deeds of the past. Come over to a camp where 
Lincoln and Grant, and Garfield and Harrison, and Mc- 
Kinley and Roosevelt and Taft have been captains, and 
join the great army of American men and women that is 
at this very moment awaiting the bugle call and the order 
Forward, March, to a new campaign of victory and public 



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